


Phosphorescent

by darkrosaleen



Category: Bandom, Fall Out Boy
Genre: Age Difference, Come Marking, M/M, Pining, Tattoos, Twink Joe Trohman
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-15
Updated: 2018-04-15
Packaged: 2019-04-23 08:40:36
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,453
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14328738
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/darkrosaleen/pseuds/darkrosaleen
Summary: Andy can't think of anyone whose internal colors shine brighter than Joe's.





	Phosphorescent

**Author's Note:**

  * For [uglowian](https://archiveofourown.org/users/uglowian/gifts).



The first time Andy sees the kid play, it gives him an anxiety attack. Just what the world needs, an underage mini-Pete in Pete's band. Same tortured hair, same wall-climbing hyperactivity, same offbeat, boyish good looks. Let him bake for a few more years, and he'll be getting the same kind of attention. Maybe he already is.

Joe is playing circles around the rest of Arma Angelus, and Andy convinces himself that that's why he can't look away. Joe also has Pete's infectious energy, that magnetic stage presence that can't be explained by just looks. Andy thinks he could watch this kid play for hours.

Pete finds Andy after the show and tackles him in a sweaty, shirtless hug. "You came! Was it love at first sight? Are you going to run away and join our side band now?"

Andy laughs nervously. "If I ever do, you'll be the first to know about it. Hang on to the Trohman kid, though. He's got something."

Pete grins. "I told you. I've got an eye for talent, why do you think I hang out with you?"

Joe wanders out from backstage. His bare chest is glittering with sweat, highlighting the fragile ridges of exposed ribs and collarbones. It strikes Andy as a very punk kind of sexy, lean and hungry.

Joe's eyes go huge. "Holy shit, you're Andy Hurley." _Sixteen_ , Andy reminds himself. "Pete didn't tell me you'd be here."

Pete grins dangerously. "He still says he won't join the band. He's immune to my charms, do you want to try the puppy eyes?"

Joe looks mournfully at Andy like a cartoon bloodhound puppy whose mother has just been hit by a car. He has huge blue eyes that make Andy think of stormy lake water. Andy laughs nervously, unsure what to do with his hands.

"Not fair," Andy says. "Pete, stop getting teenagers to do your dirty work."

Joe's face drops a little, and Andy kicks himself—the worst thing to do to a teenager is call them young—but then Joe straightens again and gives Andy a dirty grin that's all too familiar. "I think he likes me."

This fucking kid is going to be the death of him, just like Pete was before.

-

A few years later, the side project has a _motherfucking record deal_ , and Joe has grown into his face a little more. All of them are burning with creative fervor, with passion and youth and purpose, and sometimes Andy wishes he burned like that too.

Joe's blond hair burns especially bright. It's the warm, unnatural yellow of banana candy, a color that comes from melanin and cheap drugstore bleach. Years later, Andy will look at a skinny, white-blond Patrick and think that it doesn't have the same charm.

It's a night when Andy is just done, a hard block of ice lodging in his chest at the thought of making conversation with strangers. Joe's hair shines like a comforting beacon across the living room. He's using animated hand gestures to relate some recent stage injury to one of Pete's friends, and Andy wonders if they're falling as fast and hard as he did.

Pete suddenly appears at Andy's side, holding a mug of milky coffee. "I didn't know you liked blonds."

Andy's face goes hot. "I've always liked blonds. I can give you a resume."

Pete takes a sip of coffee. "I feel old. Do you think we'll absorb their youth and beauty if we sleep in a van with them long enough?"

Andy smiles for the first time that night. "I think that only works on virgins."

They're comfortably silent for a moment, watching Joe's conversation from across the room. Eventually, Pete knocks his shoulder into Andy's. "You hanging in there okay? I could dare him to dye his hair green, then he'd be less hot."

Andy chuckles. "I think it's a lost cause. For many reasons." Not least because he's pretty sure Joe would look just as good with green hair.

Pete gives him a sympathetic smile, then another shoulder bump. "Hey, Blondie," he yells, waving Joe over. As soon as Joe is in grabbing range, Pete reached up and ruffles his curls, which Joe begrudgingly accepts. "Mm, fluffy. Grab your stuff, Goldilocks. Hurley's ready to go."

Joe gives Andy an exasperated look. "Is this what being blond is like?"

Andy grins. "It's what having hair texture that deviates from Caucasian beauty standards is like. Which _certain people_ should be more sensitive to."

Pete latches onto Joe's back like a koala. "It's what being cute is like. You'll have to get in a horrible face-scarring accident before anyone will leave you alone." He reaches up to pet Joe's head again, and it turns into a wrestling match. Nobody notices Andy's gaze lingering on Joe's hair, his fingers itching to touch.

-

"I want this," Joe says, dragging slow fingers up and down Andy's forearm. He's a stoned lump in Andy's lap, who's leaning against a stack of boxes in an empty signing tent. It's well past midnight, and the lights and noise in the bus were getting to Joe, so they went to hide in the dark.

It takes Andy a moment to realize that Joe is talking about his tattoos. "You already have some," he says, poking Joe's stomach until he bursts into giggles.

"No, I want. I want." The fingers come back to Andy's arm, searching for the word that's hiding from Joe's brain. "Colors. Bright colors, all over. Like your insides are on the outside." He tries to thread his fingers through Andy's, but his hands are too clumsy, so he gives up and squeezes Andy's hand against his chest. "I want my insides on the outside too."

Andy can't think of anyone whose internal colors shine brighter than Joe's. Then again, their horny teenage fanbase has failed to make Joe a national heartthrob, so maybe Andy's alone in this.

"You'd look good with sleeves," Andy says. Joe looks good in everything, but he's got that skinny, messy punk vibe that looks really good with tattoos. Andy thinks about the way the muscles and tendons in Joe's arms stand out when he plays, and how they would look painted with color. How they would look holding Andy's thighs apart, or sinking long fingers into his ass.

Andy has to shuffle his boner away from Joe's head, and Joe isn't high enough not to notice. He breaks into quiet, wheezing giggles, face buried in Andy's knee.

"You're into it," Joe says, tracing his fingers over and over the ink on Andy's calf. "You want me tatted up like a Suicide Girl? You want to come all over my tattoos, get them all messy?"

It's the kind of thing Joe says all the time when he's high—dumb and dirty and hotter than it should be, a direct line to his twenty-year-old libido. By the time Joe sobers up and drags Andy into his bunk for a long awaited blowjob, Andy will have forgotten all about it.

But later that summer, Joe will go off to an appointment and come back with the beginnings of a half sleeve on his arm. Andy will have a miserable time leaving it alone until it heals, wanting to trace over the swirling lines, the places where dark ink meets light skin. He'll rub lotion on Joe's raw skin, offering comfort and home remedies when the itching gets really bad. He'll hope that Pete's shitty taste in tattoos doesn't rub off.

And eight years after that, they'll once again be shocked and giddy that Fall Out Boy has a national arena tour, albeit for very different reasons. Joe will be beautiful in ways that Andy never could have pictured when he was a skinny teenager, strong and masculine with stubble and properly nourished hair. And ink twisting all over his arms, glittering and shining under the stage lights.

Bunk sex will never get easier, but Andy will come to love the way the dim light flattens Joe's eyes to soft grey, the way it mutes the vibrant colors on his arms. He'll sit with his back to Joe's chest and let him touch, watching strong hands wander over his own decorated skin. 

Andy will come all over Joe's hand and colorful wrist, and he'll be struck by the sight of shiny, pearly white on tattooed skin. A buried memory from a long-gone tour venue will resurface, and it will suddenly hit Andy how many years he's had with those hands, how lucky he is to have seen that beauty grow.

But that's the future. Right now, Joe's arms are bare, and they're both young, and the world is glowing with possibility.

**Author's Note:**

> I owed a ficlet to Uglowian, who requested a 1500 word ode to the ethereal beauty of Joe Trohman.
> 
> Not really. Actual prompt was "Andy/Joe, phosphorescence," which could only be filled with a 1500 word ode to Joe Trohman's beauty.


End file.
